


extending a hand

by princessoftheworlds



Category: Torchwood
Genre: 5+1 Things, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, M/M, Male-Female Friendship, Vague Dinner and a Show references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:01:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27707311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princessoftheworlds/pseuds/princessoftheworlds
Summary: Five dinner invitations that Tosh extended to Ianto and the one she couldn't.
Relationships: Ianto Jones & Toshiko Sato, Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones, Mary/Toshiko Sato, Owen Harper/Toshiko Sato, Tommy Brockless/Toshiko Sato
Comments: 22
Kudos: 63





	extending a hand

**Author's Note:**

  * For [m_feys](https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_feys/gifts).



> Happy birthday, Chris! You asked for Tosh-Ianto friendship, and I hope I delivered. There's some vague Dinner and a Show references, but they're not really spoilery. I mean, the basic premise is that the audio is set at an opera with aliens lmao. Again, happy birthday!

It’s a muggy day in July, Tosh’s birthday in fact, when she enters the Hub, cog door rolling shut behind her, red lights flashing, alarm blaring, and finds her usual cup of coffee on her desk along with her favorite pastry in a brown paper bag and a present.

It’s square-shaped and nicely-wrapped in shiny silver paper that reflects the lights as Tosh tilts it back and forth with curiosity. 

For a moment, she ponders who it could be from. Suzie, despite being generally friendly towards her on occasion, is not one for social niceties like remembering birthdays and gifting presents, nor is Owen, no matter how much Tosh wishes it might be from him. It could be Jack, who always remembers birthdays, but he’s not in yet, most likely out brooding on a rooftop. Besides, the last two years, he took her out for a nice lunch where he entertained her with a story about being chased by an alien cow through a forest that could only narrowly be true.

Which leaves Ianto. He’s only been working at Torchwood Three for a few months now, and he and Tosh don’t  _ really  _ talk aside from him asking her what she wants for lunch. Well, they have chatted a few times, but she always figured that was just him being polite. 

However the coffee and pastry kind of make it obvious who the gifter is. 

Tosh cuts through the small pieces of tape that secure the wrapping and reveals a thick, well-bound volume of Japanese fairy tales, briefly flashing back to the conversation she and Ianto had about prominent literature from their childhood. Ianto had expressed an interest in Sherlock Holmes, which Tosh sensed was actually a bit deeper than he let on.

She corners him in the archives, shyly clutching her gift behind her back. “Thank you,” she says, and his expression becomes adorably bewildered before it shifts to knowing as she gestures to the book.

“You’re welcome,” Ianto tells her, smiling. “You seemed quite nostalgic for the fairy tales from your childhood when we last talked.” He nods towards the book, still grasping the alien candle he’d been in the midst of categorizing. “I hope you enjoy them.”

Nodding, Tosh shifts her weight from one heel to the next. Her dress sways slightly against her bare legs; it’s not a wise choice for a day of work at Torchwood, where any moment now, she could be called out to chase after a Weevil or Hoix, but she’d wanted to look nice.

After all, this is all her day is. Work, lunch with Jack, and then a long evening in by herself, with wine and maybe a Japanese film.

“Would you perhaps like to get dinner with me this evening?” she asks without meaning to, and watches Ianto blink slowly. “As friends, I mean.”

Ianto’s expression is briefly pained, though he attempts to hide it well. Finally, he says, “I would love to, but I’m afraid that I can’t tonight.”

“Oh.”

She schools her crestfallen expression and quickly turns to leave before Ianto’s calling her back.

“Tosh,” he says with an apologetic smile, “Rain check? I think I could do dinner tomorrow.”

Tosh smiles brilliantly. “Then it’s a plan.”

* * *

Ianto’s tugging the jumper over his head when there’s a sudden knock at his door, and he nearly stumbles over a stray trainer in his haste to answer it. He pauses and stares at the lone trainer for a moment, remembering how he’d kicked it off there while trying to also free Jack of his greatcoat, and his cheeks burn red.

He pulls the door open before his visitor can knock again and is surprised to find that it’s Tosh, swimming in slightly large sweats and carrying a pizza. Her eyes are red-rimmed as if she’s been crying recently. 

After the week she’s had, Ianto can’t fault her.

“May I come in?” she asks, because it’s Tosh. Even when she’s still heartbroken over a murderous alien, she’s still unflinchingly polite.

“Of course,” Ianto replies, and steps aside to allow her entry. Carefully, she removes her trainers and squares them neatly besides his dress shoes. It’s something he appreciates about her, Tosh’s respect for others’ cleanliness and tidiness, even if it’s more of a cultural aspect for her. “Why don’t you place the pizza on the coffee table and I’ll find us some plates?”

When he returns, bearing two plates and also two beers, which he senses she desperately needs, Tosh is sitting awkwardly on his couch, her hands in her lap.

“I’m sorry,” she apologizes. “I didn’t know where else to go.”

“I don’t mind,” he admits. “I could use the company.” He hands her a beer and a bottle opener, flipping open the pizza box as she uncaps both their beers. “Sorry. I don’t have wine.”

“It’s alright.” Tosh smiles weakly at his politeness. “I didn’t exactly give you warning either before I showed up at your door.”

Ianto laughs kindly, saying, “You did buy me dinner.” He hands her a plate with a slice before taking one for himself. Then he sits beside her on the couch. “Would you like to talk?”

It takes one slice and half a bottle of beer for the full story to come spilling out of Tosh. Well, not the full story. They already all knew about that. A murderous alien stranded on Earth who discovered Torchwood had found her a way home, who seduced Tosh to the point where Tosh fell for her, who convinced Tosh to smuggle her into the Hub, and who ultimately met death at Jack’s hand.

Bitterly, Ianto wonders how many other girlfriends and partners have met their ends at Jack’s hands, because of Torchwood. He knows there’s something in Owen’s file, a footnote about a dead fiancée that Ianto is not supposed to be aware of. He wonders how long it will be before Gwen’s long-time boyfriend meets a similar fate before he shakes those grim thoughts away.

Tosh is silently crying, tears trickling down her smooth skin. “Mary had been  _ so kind, _ ” she is saying, “ _ so understanding. _ She had ways of making me feel like we were the only ones who existed when we were alone together.” Ianto nods with understanding. “It felt like I’d known her my entire life when I only met her we-” She freezes, eyes widening with horror. “ _ Oh, Ianto. _ I’m so, so sorry! I didn’t realize.”

He shakes his head. “It’s been enough time,” he says slightly numbly.

“Tell me about her?” asks Tosh, resting a gentle hand over his.

It takes a few minutes to swallow down the sudden lump in his throat, to find the right words. Then he begins, “When I first met Lisa, it was my first day at Torchwood, and I had just spilled coffee down my front.”

* * *

Several months later, Tosh and Ianto find themselves in the same situation except this time, they actually have wine. Several bottles, in fact. And there are no aliens or no opera this time.

“What a bastard!” grouses Tosh, fingers clutched loosely around the current bottle as she pours herself another glass. The bottle runs dry, and she glances between it and her glass as the level of wine in her class remains stagnant.

“Hold on,” slurs Ianto. “I’ll get you a new bottle.” Then he stumbles over from the coffee table towards the kitchen and retrieves a bottle of whisky from a cupboard. Briefly, he scowls at the label, bewildered. He doesn’t recognize it, but somewhere from the alcohol-hazy dredges of his brain emerges the memory of Jack bringing the bottle over one night. They’d gotten straight to their, um,  _ activities  _ and had forgotten about the bottle.

His scowl increases, grip tightening, and he stumbles back to the table. “I found this.”

“ _ Ooooh, expensive, _ ” cooes Tosh, making grabby hands for the bottle.

“I think Jack bought it,” Ianto admits, and watches Tosh’s eyes narrow. 

“We’re definitely drinking this,” Tosh says, and drags the bottle closer. She uses the high-tech alien bottle opener she stole from the Hub to uncap it, pouring an unhealthy amount into Ianto’s glass. 

He reaches for his glass and nearly blanches once he takes a sip of the whisky. He swallows, and the liquor burns down his throat, Ianto nearly gagging. His second sip goes down much smoother.

“As I was saying,” Tosh continues. “ _ What a bastard. _ ”

“Owen or Jack?” Ianto asks. It started getting hard for him to concentrate two glasses of wine ago, and now his focus is shot. In fact, even Tosh is beginning to blur before his eyes.

“Owen!” Tosh says. “I asked him to fill out his reports today for the Weevil hunt from yesterday, and he didn’t even bother.” Her pink-painted lips curl into a scowl of her own. “And when I  _ asked  _ him about them, he had  _ the audacity  _ to tell me he didn’t know what I was talking about _ to my face. _ ” Her gesticulating becomes wild enough that Ianto moves back her wine glass to avoid an unfortunate accident.

“He didn’t listen to me when I asked him to clean the SUV either,” grumbles Ianto. Then his mind trips back to a memory involving Jack, him, and the SUV, and he blushes, becoming lost in thought. He’s dragged back when Tosh places a gentle hand on his.

“Where’d you go?” she teases.

“Nowhere.” Ianto glances back towards the bottle of whisky and pushes it away. “Shall we order dinner?”

“Christ, yes,” Tosh says enthusiastically, awkwardly nodding her head. “I’m starving! Pizza?” She frowns. “Wait, no more pizza.”

“I don’t think I can eat any more pizza,” Ianto replies. Most of his meals from this week consisted of pizza and coffee, and he hadn’t actually returned home until today. “Indian?”

Tosh tilts her head, considering it. “Yes! I’ll get the menus.” Then she darts off to Ianto’s kitchen as he pours himself another glass of whisky.

* * *

“What would you like to order?” Ianto asks as Tosh gazes at the restaurant’s menu in bewilderment. Everything is in French, and thus, she continues frowning. 

“I don’t know,” she admits to Ianto. “I can’t read French. I don’t know what half these dishes are.”

And Ianto chuckles. “Nor do I. Shall we just ask the server their recommendations?”

Tosh beams. “We shall.” Politely, she flags their server over and orders essentially whatever they recommended before requesting a bottle of wine. Once they are left alone at the table, she drums her fingers against the white tablecloth. Finally, she says, “Thank you for inviting me out, Ianto. I really needed it...after everything that happened with Tommy.”

“How are you, Tosh?” Ianto asks, sliding his hand across the table to clutch gently at her fingers. “How do you feel?”

She glances down, expression indecipherable. “I don’t know how I feel,” she says finally, sniffling slightly. “This is different from Mary. This is an innocent man we let go to his death because we had to keep the universe from ripping itself apart.”

“No one said Torchwood would be easy,” Ianto replies, but his eyes are sympathetic. He clears his throat with a cough. “Almost every day, I wake up wondering who Torchwood is going to sacrifice next.”

Her nod is slight; there are tears glimmering at the corners of her dark eyes. “How many more days until it’s someone we love on the line?” A beat. “How many more days until it’s  _ one of us? _ ” Tosh sniffles again, turning away. “Sorry,” she apologizes, voice thick.

“Don’t,” Ianto tells her. “You’re right. That keeps me up at night.” Keeps Jack up as well, but he doesn’t mention this. He clears his throat again. “Did I tell you about how Jack took me out to the Italian restaurant across the Plass last week?”

Tosh brightens up. “No, please do tell!” She smiles excitedly at him. 

“He made reservations and picked me up in a car that definitely wasn’t the SUV,” Ianto says. “And brought me flowers.”

Her eyes widen. “What kind?” she asks in awe.

“Roses,” Ianto replies, and watches her eyes widen even further.

Their meals arrive in record-time, and the server pours them two full glasses of red wine. By the time their dinner is over, the bill is paid, and Ianto has helped Tosh into her coat before pulling on his own, it’s sprinkling outside. 

Ianto scowls at the sky from where he and Tosh stand under an awning. “It wasn’t supposed to rain today.”

Tosh, reaching a hand out under the awning to feel the rain droplets against her skin, giggles. She’s still tipsy from the wine. “It’s only rain, Ianto,” she tells him before darting out into the shower, Ianto watching on in shock. She twirls around, the lavender silk of her dress flaring out with her momentum. “Come dance with me!”

“No,” he says stubbornly, but when she raises an eyebrow at him, he begrudgingly follows, taking up her hand and beginning to lead her in a slow waltz. Tosh begins to hum, and they sway to faint music under the moonlight.

Tosh giggles again, and Ianto finds himself chuckling along, heart light and happy.

* * *

It’s Valentine’s Day, and this year, unlike last, Tosh doesn’t bother asking Owen to come to the opera with her. It’s also his birthday, and she knows he would rather spend it getting shit-faced in a pub or playing video games.

So she asks Ianto instead.

“I’m sorry,” he tells her, expression apologetic after she asks him to go to the opera with him again, joking about it being a running event. “Jack...is actually taking me out somewhere tomorrow.” He ducks his head, blushing brightly.

Her mouth drops, her eyes widening. “ _ Oh, _ ” she says. She beams. “Where is he taking you?”

Ianto grins boyishly, and she can tell that he is genuinely happy. “I don’t know,” he admits with a slight shrug of his shoulders. “Jack didn’t say. He wanted it to be a surprise.” The upward tilt of his voice belies his faint frustration. 

“You don’t like that, do you?” Tosh teases. “The fact that he didn’t tell you?”

He shakes his head, pouting only slightly. “How am I supposed to know what to plan for? Will he take me out for dinner or for an activity? Do I dress casually or in a suit?”

She glances contemplatively at the cup of coffee Ianto had been delivering to her desk when she’d asked. Then she reaches for the cup and takes a sip of Ianto’s usual divine coffee, sighing grateful. “Good coffee,” she tells him, and he chuckles. “And I can’t advise you too well, considering that I don’t go on many dates as it is, but I think you can’t go wrong with smart casual. A dress shirt and trousers, perhaps?”

“You’re brilliant, Tosh,” he tells her, and is about to say something further when Jack shouts from his office for his coffee. Ianto sighs. “Have to go appease Prince Charming.”

Tosh giggles and continues drinking her coffee as Ianto leaves.

She spends Valentine’s Day curled up in bed watching old black and white movies and drinking wine, wishing that she too - like Ianto - had a warm body to curl up against. 

The next evening, after a long day of squinting at alien codes on her desktop, Tosh is settling down before her telly with another glass of wine when there’s a knock on her door.

Shoulders slumped, she rises from her couch and shuffles over to open the door only to find Ianto standing outside with a plastic bag in his hand.

“Ianto?” she asks, cocking her head. “What are you doing here?”

“Couldn’t let our plans go to waste, Tosh,” Ianto tells her, grinning again. He lifts a foil-wrapped package from the plastic bag. Chocolate. “I brought you a gift. Milk chocolate for you, dark for me.” He hands her the package. “Discounted too.”

“You’re a brilliant man, Ianto Jones.” Tosh closes the door behind him and takes his coat before leading him to the couch. “Would you like some wine?”

“Yes, please,” he calls as she drifts to the kitchen. “What are we watching?”

“Casablanca,” she replies. “I have some lasagna leftovers for dinner. I’ll heat those up as well. Got the recipe from Gwen!”

“You always treat me well, Toshiko Sato.”

* * *

The gravestone is carved from smooth grey marble and inscribed simply with a name,birth date and death date. The young dark-haired man who leans against the gravestone is dressed in a somber suit and cradles a bottle of expensive wine, a bouquet of lilies resting by his knee. There are dried tear trails on his cheeks.

Ianto Jones sniffles as he addresses his departed friend. “It’s been three months, Tosh,” he says. “Three months since you and Owen…” He tears his gaze away from the gravestone, focusing on his knee. He drifts a hand out to gently stroke a petal from the bouquet.

“Gwen can’t stop crying,” he begins again. “Yesterday, I found her sobbing at your desk. She had just wanted to borrow a pen from me, but she found a note you’d written me that I’d kept and broken down.” He smiles wetly. “I made her coffee and then went and cried down in the archives. Every day, she says she doesn’t think she can keep doing this anymore, can keep working at Torchwood, yet she shows back up every morning and asks for a cup of coffee.” 

The gravestone doesn’t respond. Gravestones don’t do that. Yet Ianto likes to imagine he can hear what Tosh would say.

_ That’s our Gwen. Soft-hearted but still tough as nails. Jack always said she was the most human of us. _

And she would grin at him and suggest inviting Gwen to come to dinner with them.

Ianto lifts the bottle of wine to his lips and takes a long slug. “Jack has a lost look in his eyes,” he continues. “Sometimes I’ll catch him glancing around the Hub, looking at your or Owen’s desks like he doesn’t know where you’ve gone. He has that look more and more often nowadays, and it’s almost scaring me. He hasn’t been the same since he was buried.” He shudders. “Jack doesn’t talk about it, doesn’t tell me anything, but he has nightmares every night.”

The wine is light and fruity on his tongue. It’s not to his usual taste, but it’s a flavor Tosh used to love. She’d certainly brought it to their dinners enough. 

_ You need to talk to him,  _ Tosh would urge him.  _ Convince Jack to open up, to talk to you.  _

That, or she would engage Jack herself, convince him to tell her a story about his time as a Time Agent, ease him into a conversation. Jack had always loved Tosh, had always been proud of her. Her death hit him particularly hard.

The bottle’s nearly empty, and Ianto’s running out of things to say. He never thought he’d run out of things to say to Toshiko Sato, but it’s hard to make conversation when there’s only one person involved. 

“I miss you,” he admits finally. “I miss you and Owen so much, Tosh.” He sniffles loudly, tears slipping back down his cheeks. “I made both of you coffee the other day. Some days, I see your mugs in the cupboards, and I can barely hold on to myself until I can make it to the archives to cry.”

He inhales sharply, taking another sip from the bottle. After a few minutes, he dries his tears with a handkerchief from his pocket and stretches to his feet, shaking the pins and needles from his limbs.

“I’ll see you around, Tosh,” Ianto says, setting the bottle down. It tips against the soft ground as Ianto walks away, clinking against the gravestone, the base shimmering with a thin layer of rosy wine, never to be finished.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr [here](http://princess-of-the-worlds.tumblr.com/) or on Twitter [here](https://twitter.com/rajkumarinik). I tweet and reblog mostly Torchwood with occasionally amusing commentary on nonsense. Please come talk to me and tell me if/how much you like my fic or like ask me about it on tumblr; all my schoolwork has become remote now, and I have limited social interaction.


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